I know that today is your first birthday, and even though I know that you still don’t know how to read I wanted to write you a letter to capture the feelings I have in my heart. I know that is some years you will read and I hope you will see in these words that you are a little person that makes my life a lot happier.

One of the things that hurts the most during your first year is that you never got a chance to meet my Granpa. Like my mother in law said, he was the main supporting character in the story of my life. A lot of who I am as a man today I owe to him. He lefts us way too early in my opinion. Even though you have your Grandpa, my father, very close to you and I am sure you will learn lots from him, I say it from the heart that “Toñito” (that was the nickname they had for him at work) was someone that like you are doing now, changed my life. From him I learned that the truth is very powerful and we must always follow it. From him I learned that learning is the most important thing we can do while here, because knowledge is the one thing that nobody can take away from you.

I hope that somehow I can tell you all that stories that I have in my mind, some that I lived with him, some that I heard from him. He is not here with us, but that is the beauty of the circle of life; now you are here to keep me company. I saw you not too long ago and that smile with just two little teeth warmed my heart a lot, I hope to see it more and more as you grow up.

I want you to know that even though I am not close to you proximity wise, I have you in my heart close to your little sister whom I want you to love as much as I love my sister. I hope all of your dreams come true and I know that you will get very far in this life. I hope to be here for all of the success you will have in live, but with the same love my Granpa told me, I now say to you, “I Believe in You.”

“Do not believe me unless I do what my father does. But if I do it, even though you do not believe me, believe the miracles, that you may know and understand that the father is in me, and I in the father.”
John 10:37-38